Introduction: Novel coronavirus disease is a very infectious respiratory infection transmitted from person-to-person and manifest commonly with fever, dry cough, difficulty breathing, fatigue, myalgia and dyspnea. The World Health Organization (WHO) used the term 2019 novel coronavirus to refer to a coronavirus that affected the lower respiratory tract of patients with pneumonia in Wuhan, China on 29 December 2019. Persons with comorbidities and the aged are most vulnerable to severe disease and accounted for over 40% of deaths globally. Methods:A cross-sectional study involving 320 adult males and females above the age of 18 years was conducted across all seven sub-districts of the Kintampo North Municipal. A total of 21 communities were selected by random sampling and 15 individuals interviewed. Systematic sampling was used to select 15 houses in each community and one household selected by simple random sampling if more than one household in a house. Simple random sampling was used to select one participant for inclusion in the study. Stata version15 software was used for the analysis and reported in frequencies and percentages. Bivariate and multivariate analysis was further conducted to find associations between adherence to COVID-19 safety protocols and the demographic and main variables of the study.Results: About 98% of the study participants demonstrated high level of awareness regarding COVID-19. Even though about 82% of participants reported to be practicing hand washing under running water, almost of all (81.9%) do not satisfy the correct hand washing procedure. The study found significant association between education and adherence to COVID-19 safety protocols. Even though the level of awareness was very high, the study revealed that about 94% of the participants are not adhering to the various preventive measures recommended by the Ministry of Health. About 28.3% of the study participants do not know any sign or symptom of COVID-19. About 95% of the participants are worried about getting infected with COVID-19 and 96% knows the importance of wearing nose mask even though only 24.2% used a nose mask. Conclusion:There is high level of awareness about COVID-19 in the public mostly through the media but most of the people do not adhere to the preventive measures to prevent themselves from infection. Intensified education and enforcement of the preventive measures will be required to interrupt the chain of transmission since the level of awareness seems not to translate to actual practice of preventing infection.
Background HIV/AIDS remains a threat to global development and human security. Sub-Saharan Africa is the worst affected, with an estimated 25.7 million people living with HIV as at 2018 and the youth accounting for 33% of new infections. Despite the high proportion, there is paucity of data on testing and counselling among the youth and which factors influence their decision are largely unknown. This study assessed factors influencing uptake of HIV testing and counselling among the youth aged 15 to 24 years in Kintampo South District in Ghana. Methods This was a cross-sectional study involving the youth who have lived in the Kintampo South District for not less than 6 months. A total of 309 respondents aged 15 to 24 years were drawn from four sub-districts of the six administrative sub-districts by simple random sampling. Simple proportions and logistic regression analyses were performed to elucidate factors influencing uptake of HIV testing and counselling. The level of acceptable statistical significance used was p<0.05. Results Overall, the proportion of the youth 15 to 24 years who ever tested for HIV was 50.2%. Lack of confidentiality and privacy, inconvenient facility opening hours, fear of positive results, and perceived poor attitude and mistrust of health service providers reportedly were the main barriers to uptake of HIV testing and counselling. Further logistic regression analyses showed that demographic factors including age, marital status and occupation as well as ever heard of HIV testing and counselling, convenience of test, willingness to test, importance of test and location of test, were key determinants of HIV testing and counselling. Conclusion Giving that about half of the respondents had never had a test and did not know their infection status, has serious implications for HIV control in the Kintampo South District. Even though a significant number of the youth showed interest in knowing their infection status, this did not reflect uptake of HIV testing. Public health effort targeted to the youth should be intensified to increase HIV testing and counselling among the youth in the Kintampo South District.
Introduction:Tuberculosis is ranked the second cause of mortalities in the world only behind the deadly COVID-19. The disease is very communicable especially in poorly ventilated environments and crowded places. High risk of transmission from patients to health workers and then to the general population has been a great worry for the tuberculosis control programme worldwide. While great efforts has been made to improve case detection and improve treatment outcomes using DOTS most districts in Africa still fall below the expected target. This study explored factors affecting TB case detection in Kwahu East District of the Eastern Region of Ghana. Methodology:A cross-sectional study involving 138 tuberculosis patients on treatment was used. A nonprobability sampling method (i.e., convenient sampling technique) was employed to study the TB patients due to the availability of the participants at the various treatment centres. A structured questionnaire was used to interview participants and the results analyzed using SPSS version 20.0. Data was presented in tables and figures in the form of descriptive statistics. Results:The result revealed that100 were males (72.46%) and 38 (27.54%) were females. The level of knowledge was above average (52.9%) among the TB patients. Majority of the TB patients reported to have suffered one form of stigmatization (weighted stigma score is 3.0). While the health facility remained the most reliable place for TB care most, TB cases reported they rather sought treatment from Prayer Camp (44.2%) as the number one choice. Reasons for choice of treatment place were distance (41.3%), cost (33.3%), belief of effective treatment outcome (10.1%) and shortage of medications (28.3%). Conclusion:In conclusion, the study revealed that knowledge about TB was above average. However, factors such as stigmatization, poor accessibility and shortage of medications affect TB case detection in the district. Conscious efforts should therefore be made to improve access, regular supply of medications and reduce stigmatization in the community and health facilities.
Background HIV/AIDS remains a threat to global development and human security. Sub-Saharan Africa is the worst affected, with an estimated 25.7 million people living with HIV as at 2018 and the youth accounting for 33% of new infections. Despite the high proportion, there is paucity of data on testing and counselling among the youth and which factors influence their decision are largely unknown. This study assessed factors influencing uptake of HIV testing and counselling among the youth aged 15 to 24 years in Kintampo South District in Ghana. Methods This was a cross-sectional study involving the youth who have lived in the Kintampo South District for not less than 6 months. A total of 309 respondents aged 15 to 24 years were drawn from four sub-districts of the six administrative sub-districts by simple random sampling. Simple proportions and logistic regression analyses were performed to elucidate factors influencing uptake of HIV testing and counselling. The level of acceptable statistical significance used was p < 0.05. Results Overall, the proportion of the youth 15 to 24 years who ever tested for HIV was 50.2%. Lack of confidentiality and privacy, inconvenient facility opening hours, fear of positive results, and perceived poor attitude and mistrust of health service providers reportedly were the main barriers to uptake of HIV testing and counselling. Further logistic regression analyses showed that demographic factors including age, marital status and occupation as well as ever heard of HIV testing and counselling, convenience of test, willingness to test, importance of test and location of test, were key determinants of HIV testing and counselling. Conclusion Giving that about half of the respondents had never had a test and did not know their infection status, has serious implications for HIV control in the Kintampo South District. Even though a significant number of the youth showed interest in knowing their infection status, this did not reflect uptake of HIV testing. Public health effort targeted to the youth should be intensified to increase HIV testing and counselling among the youth in the Kintampo South District.
Background: Access to skilled delivery services are crucial in reducing maternal mortality, however, the prevalence of women with assisted deliveries in our health facilities remains low with reasonable disparities between rural and urban Ghana. This study examined the utilization of skilled delivery by pregnant women and its associated factors in the Wa Municipality of Ghana.Methods: The study employed a community-based cross-sectional study. A simple random sampling was used to recruit two rural and two urban sub-districts and subsequently four communities selected from each of the respective sub-districts. Thirty-three eligible women of reproductive age (15- 49 years) who had delivered within the last one-year prior to the commencement of the study were selected from each community. A structured questionnaire was used to collate information on respondents socio-demographic, geographic and cultural factors that affect the utilization of skilled delivery services. Data was analyzed using Stata Statistical Software (version 12), frequencies and percentages were used to summarize data and associations between variables investigated with multiple regression analyses at a significance of p<0.05.Results: Out of the 527 women interviewed, 481 (91.6%) had a skilled delivery. Mothers were aged between 15 and 45 years with mean (± SD) age of 26.4 ± 9.4 years. After statistical adjustment, rural residence (AOR=2.7, 95% CI 0.8 – 8.9, p=0.036 compared with urban residence), never attended antenatal care (AOR=101, 95% CI 10.2 – 1017, p<0.001), health facility delivery (AOR=0.1, 95% CI 0.1 – 0.6, p<0.001), time taken to nearest health facility (≥31 minutes AOR=11.7, 95% CI 3.6 – 38.6, p<0.001), and no Husband’s consent (AOR=4.6, 95% CI 1.8 – 11.6, p<0.001) were significantly associated with uptake of skilled delivery services.Conclusion: The findings of this study demonstrate adequate utilization of skilled delivery services among women in the Municipality. Efforts towards improvement of skilled delivery coverage should focus on health education, especially among rural women together with the expansion of healthcare services.
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